The Draziri

Pronunciation: Drah`zeer`ee

History

The draziri have a deeply rich culture. With the draziri’s ability to fly, they developed a much broader view of their world… Draz’kia, for she was mother, and Draz’yak, the sun, was their father. Draz’kia gave them food and shelter, but harshly punished the foolish. Draz’yak was vigilant as he spent his days watching over his children, while keeping predators at bay, and teaching his children to do likewise, at night.

For generations, the draziri learned the lessons taught to them by their parents, Draz’kia and Draz’yak. The draziri were the center of the universe, watched over and loved by the two most powerful beings they knew.

Until that world view was all but shattered in the 2480s when a Foresight subsidiary , Raw Power Minerals, landed on the planet to setup an base of operations. First contact did not go well. Initially, RPM employees saw the ape-like appearance of the draziri to indicate they were little more than animals, and attempted to “scare off” the draziri shaman sent to greet these strange beings. When other draziri came to the shaman’s aid, the attacking RPM employees decided “killing a couple should definitely scare the rest off”, and it did… until the draziri tribe mounted an ill fated full scale attack on the RPM intruders the following day.

No other sentient species had been discovered up to that point by any of the Stellar Nations. Nobody in RPM had any idea what was required in such a situation. Furthermore, RPM had already purchased the rights to the draziri’s star system, which contained a very rich asteroid belt and several equally equitable moons. The draziri home world was the only planet in the system and, as such, an incredibly cheap place to set up an operations base. In the end, RPM administration decided the best course was to keep the knowledge of the draziri a secret, and, perhaps even use “the primitives” as a cheap labor force.

Over the next two decades, RPM “relocated” tens of thousands of draziri, entire tribes at a time, to work the various mining sites erected throughout their own star system.

In 2508, the draziri secret was revealed when an RPM transport suffered a systems malfunction while entering the draziri’s star system and sent out a distress signal, which, in turn, was picked up by a patrolling Protectorate ship. It wasn’t long after the rescue ship entered the system that GPA personnel discovered an as yet unknown sentient species aboard a Stellar Nation ship.

The discovery outraged the collective Stellar Nations. The backlash against RPM was strong enough to cause Foresight to close RPM and relinquish custody of most of RPM’s upper management to the GPA . Meanwhile, most of the tens of thousands of draziri refugees refused to return home. As the GPA dismantled RPM’s operations on the draziri home world, the refugees claimed…

“Our knowledge of the worlds among the stars puts us in a sad, but proud position. We cannot return home. Our young know not of how to live on Mother Draz’kia. Our father teaches us we must protect [however], and to keep Draz’kia safe, and to honor the teaching of Draz’yak, we stay out here, helping our father protect the skys and others so they do not learn of the stars as we have.”

While more than half of the refugees stayed in settlements within their own star system, the remaining refugees left and became citizen within the Stellar Nations that opened their boarders.

In 2597, a colonization vessel, made up of exclusively draziri, set course into the Sagittarius region… into The Third Expanse.

Personality

While the draziri on their home world hold limited contact with the draziri living in space, those no longer with Draz’kia have gone to help Father Draz’yak… they are known as Draz’yak’s Star Children. For the draziri among the stars, they hold to that title with honor, and continue to pass on the teachings of Mother Draz’kia and Father Draz’yak to their children, and even to other non-draziri who listen.

The draziri living among the humans and vuri are very slow to trust any species other than their own. If a human does gain the trust of a draziri, however, the draziri can be fiercely loyal.

Even though the last couple generations of draziri have lived among the stars with humans and vuri, they still have yet to get comfortable with modern computers or highly technological devices. They know enough to get by, but due to this limit, most draziri take more manual labors than technical ones.